


bound to the fall

by siehn



Category: Mass Effect: Andromeda
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Introspection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-25
Updated: 2021-02-25
Packaged: 2021-03-15 18:41:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29688282
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/siehn/pseuds/siehn
Summary: Somehow, falling has come to define Scott Ryder’s experience in Andromeda.
Relationships: Male Ryder | Scott/Reyes Vidal
Kudos: 8





	bound to the fall

**Author's Note:**

> This was something I started ages ago and lost momentum on. I cleaned it up and am posting it here!

Somehow, falling has come to define Scott Ryder’s experience in Andromeda.

That first time, from the shuttle over Habitat 7, jumpjet broken, SAM barely there, falling for what felt like forever until suddenly the ground rushed up and touching ground in Helius was never going to be gentle.

Lightening and Kett and Alec -

The second time, there was the rush of gasses, of the vault trying to purify itself; he barely had time to realize what was happening before he was flying through the air -falling, again- alone, his suit blaring warnings, his lungs burning, _dying_. But he wasn’t the one who died. Sometimes, he wonders if SAM defines Andromeda by loss -Ellen, Sara, Alec, Scott, even- but he can never work up the courage to ask; it feels too much like…something.

The third time, both of his feet were still on the floor – the clean, metallic floor of SAM Node, and Cora and Lexi were telling him his father _didn’t make it_ , like that was anything other than an impossibility. Alec Ryder, dying? Giving up? No, everything he knows about his father rebels at that thought, but SAM lives in him, now, and his father’s helmet is –

“You’re the Pathfinder,” Liam says, and -

The floor falls away and Scott feels like he’s spiraling down into the void, falling, with no one there to catch him until –

“Scott,” SAM calls, and the void is filled with stars, and Scott remembers how to breathe again.

He never quite stops falling, though.

The fourth time, there’s “You look like you’re waiting for someone,” a warm voice, and a shared bottle of wine on a roof at sunset, something real and vulnerable on the face of a man who is so much more than anyone believes him to be. It’s like flying, more than falling – like running the nomad full speed over the lip of a crater on H-047c, half-way to catching orbit, Vetra yelling joyfully beside him.

It’s like choosing to jump without the comfort of a jumpjet, knowing that touching ground on Helius is never gentle.

The fifth time, he hears his sister’s voice and the floor of the medbay drops away because she’s _there_ , alive and real and he has to tell her that their father is –

“Sara, dad he…didn’t make it,” he chokes, barely getting the words out and her face contorts, tears spilling even though her eyes are still closed. She’d always been the closest to him.

“What, but, no that can’t be – this is a dream, or a nightmare, dad isn’t, he can’t be—” she fades, falters, falls back into darkness that even SAM can’t call her back from.

Scott calls and calls but his sister is gone again, lost to him just like the rest of their family. He closes his eyes and SAM is there, stars in the void, telling him he is _not alone, Scott, I am here_.

Scott falls and falls and falls. Helius is rough and hard and it hurts every time.

The sixth time, Scott is trapped, hanging limply in a field, the Archon’s mocking words on repeat in his head and there is _no time_. The Salarians need them and they need Meridian and so, when SAM suggests it-

Scott leaps blindly into the void of a stuttered, faltering heartbeat, falling into the dark that rushes up to meet him. He trusts SAM to catch him, to reignite his heart and spark life back into the void and it’s like hitting the ground on Habitat 7 all over again. But he pushes himself up again and again and again because he has to.

The seventh time is a race against the Kett, falling from the only home he has in Helius – a free fall onto a station full of enemies. Later, he barely remembers it beyond the fall; it pales in comparison to what comes after.

The eight time the Archon’s voice is in his head and SAM is gone, fading, _stolen_. Darkness edges at his vision as his body shuts down without his partner embedded so deeply into his system that he cannot function without him. He takes a step, another, one more and then he falls and falls and falls and never stops, even when his eyes are open and he’s breathing again. He leads an army and saves a galaxy and his body is _falling_ all the while until -

He walks out into the sunlight of humanity’s new home and the first breath he takes is like plunging off the cliff on Habitat 7. SAM hums gently in that star-filled void inside him, the light catching him once again. He stands still, for the first time since he woke up from cryo.

Helius is many things – worn and beautiful and full of danger.

But it is not gentle.

It is falling and hitting the ground over and over and over until finally, finally he is home.

**Author's Note:**

> As ever, I am i-had-bucky over at the tumblr


End file.
